EU confirms it will take action against Poland over court reforms

I was talking about the Supreme Court since this is in Poland a point of contention.

the new law on Supreme Court hasn't been passed and was a matter of negotiations between the president and PiS leaders untill a couple of days ago - so I don't know what you are talking about - and it still hasn't been made public what kind of an agreement they have reached

@gumishuand I was talking about the appointment of regular judges when I said the German system is similar to the Polish one (actually the appointment of new judges according to the proposition from July was supposed to be made by the National Judiciary Council (KRS) and not directly by any government official like in Germany and the KRS was meant to be staffed by a mix of representatives including those elected by the parliament with 2/3 majority - so the system of appointment of judges proposed by PiS is much more democratic then the one present in Germany

not to proceed the new laws unless they fully guarantee the independence of the judiciary

to implement all EU Commission and Venice Commission recommendations in full,

to comply with the EU Court of Justice order to "immediately suspend large-scale logging" in the ancient Białowieża forest,

to respect the right of freedom of assembly,

to strongly condemn the "xenophobic and fascist march that took place in Warsaw" on Saturday, 11 November 2017, and

to take a firm stand on women's rights, by providing free and accessible contraception without discrimination and making emergency contraception available without medical prescription.

As one can see, the issue of migration is not mentioned at all. This is not about 'bureaucrats forcing migrants on Poland' but Poland's peers and partners in the EU, their colleagues and fellow governments in Europe being concerned about Poland's continual flouting of EU values and norms which we in the union generally share. We all differ because we're individual nations but none of us would ignore an EU court order such as the one on logging. Instead we would comply with it and then do our utmost to get into talks immediately to resolve things.

It seems to me that PIS likes the idea of 'a' European Union but not 'the' actual European Union. However, they will find that it will not be possible to force through reforms simply by refusing to observe existing EU norms. I, as a life-long citizen of the EU don't want to see my country's interests undermined by recent accession countries and many others share my feelings.

The only thing I really don't like about the EU, and never have done, is that Ireland used to be a very 'human' sort of country and it's become increasingly 'official' like other European countries have pretty much always been, regardless of the EU. However that's a reflection, not just of membership of the EU, but of the changing world as a whole, where you can't be quite as relaxed as you could once upon a time.

What PiS likes is the idea of foreigners pumping condition-free money into Poland, which is why they keep bringing up reparations.

yeah sure - Britain and France were beggars too cause they demanded reparations from Germany after the first World War - to the point that Germany only stopped paying those reparations to France a couple of years ago - also France is very keen to have a finance minister for the eurozone mostly to have it's budget deficit covered by German surpluses to which FDP leaders said recently 'no way' - and guess what PiS is at peace with the fact that the next EU budget will not have substantial subsidies for Poland because it was all expected long before (at the singing of the last budget already)

The current excuse for the government actions as described by the government propaganda on TV is that the EU is presently governed by the Left and that is why they despise the right-wing PiS party in power and hence all those resolutions against Poland.

On the home front the idea of demolishing the Palace of Culture in Warsaw caught the headlines in social media, the press and on TV. Promoting this idea now was Vice-Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki who said he had been dreaming of seeing Warsaw without the Palace of Culture for a long time. One may wonder if demolishing the Palace could be added to the above list in the resolution along with demolishing the ancient Białowieża Forest.

Atch so if we don't obey Germany's diktat we destabilise the union, huh? I don't want this stability if it comes at this price. By the way I haven't seen businesses being cancelled because of your perceived 'destabilisation' of the union. So what interests of Ireland are undermined, please divulge - and don't be vague, please.

The Palace of culture is a symbol of Soviet murder and domination over Poland, sadly the perceive destruction of the forest is a different issue.

In my opinion the Palace of culture should be turned into a place of memory for those hundreds of thousands if not millions murdered by the Marxist Soviets in Katyn, Ukraine, Siberia, Poland and Russia.

Yes, this is a very good idea which could commemorate all those victims. Possibly not all of the Palace as it is a big commercial place today. But demolishing it seems a truly absurd idea. Why not demolish the Warsaw citadel as well which was a sympol of the tsarist oppressions towards the Polish people where hundreds if not thousands of patriots were held and many died of whom Romuald Traugutt is the most known?

This is not a question of obeying Germany's diktats. That's both a distortion and a gross over-simplification but I don't have the patience to explain why. However, the stability of the Union derives from the ability of the member states to take care of their own individual interests whilst at the same time avoiding outright conflict and confrontation in the process of doing so. It's about discussion, compromise, building relationships, diplomacy and persuasion.

As to business being lost etc, firstly no existing multi-national company is going to pull out of Poland overnight. No large company who had planned an investment in Poland due to take place in the next year or two will pull out either unless they are prepared to sustain large losses because preparing the ground for such an investment costs a lot of money. However, the present Polish government sends a clear message that they make up the rules as they go along and change them at their whim and also that an investor who comes to Poland on the basis that it's a member of the EU, may well find a couple of years down the road that's no longer the case. Now that is in itself is an over-simplification and only scratches the surface but it gives you an idea.

All of this trouble started with Hungary, the EU Commission let that slide and that emboldened Poland. The difference is that Hungary is clever enough to stay just within the bounds of what's acceptable and thus avoid Article 7. That's because Orban has no great political passion, except to be in power but PIS are zealots, evangelicals, men with a mission led by a maniac. They've now lost the plot totally and I can't see a way back for them at present. They're simply unable to talk or negotiate so they're lost.

As far Ireland's interests go, it's just as I said. It's against all of our interests as EU members - and that includes the nation of Poland - to have an EU filled with divisions, open conflict and in-fighting.

In my opinion the Palace of culture should be turned into a place of memory

I'm afraid Dolno that would only perpetuate a lot of ill-feeling and the place would possibly become a rallying point for extremists.

You guys forget that tens of millions people and the right wing governments theyve elected esp in countries east of Germany such as pl, hungary, austria, czechy, slovakia, the baltics, bulgaria, and even northern italians, denmark, etc all feel the eu can stuff it. It is a political union that was brought in the back door and instead of uniting nations like it had in the past it is now pushing a far left agenda and is no doubt dominated by Germany amd Brussels. Even british citizens voted to leave yet I feel that the eurocrats will drag it out and force them to stay. Eu will divide between east amd West lest they come to an agreement. Obviously thr migrant issue and the dwindling euro are big on the agenda. These countries obey 99% of eu rules and laws but rhe migrant issue is a red line for many of these countries and the people in them.

@dolnoslaskThe poles paid for the palace of culture lol the Soviets made us pay it out of our own budget. But personally I think it is a beautiful building reminds us of our history. Auschwitz is also a place of death and repression yet most ppl wouldn't want to close it or demolish it.

Tens of millions have not elected anyone - add together all the votes of PiS, Fidesz and a few other whackjobs and it is less than 10 million - they are on the fringes of European politics and rightly so.

The EU is not forcing the U.K. to stay in - rather they have said that once the UK settles its bills and resolve the Irish border issue then it is free to discuss some kind of access to the single market. In fact it is the UK which is dithering about leaving, because the government knows it will be an economic disaster.

The euro is not dwindling, it has gained significantly against USD this year, and by a huge amount against the GBP. So in fact quite the opposite of what you describe.

There are no leftist radical governments in the EU. There are no leftist radical policies been passed by the EU. Piratical leftist I understand policies such as renationalisation, appropriation of private assets, wage controls and price controls, collectivised agriculture. Doing the decent thing by a few refugees is not a radical leftist agenda.

I am halfway through Andrew Breitbart book, it has a few excellent chapters but most of it feels like being locked in the bedroom with you :) Unsubstantiated facts, irrelevant arguments, obsessions over single issues, No solutions and only problems

Now here's an interesting bit of news from two points of view, firstly another example of the present Polish government being out of step with, in this case, all its fellow-members and secondly from the point of the veto. It's regarding the Doha Agreement on emissions which was voted for by everyone but Poland and has therefore never been ratified.

"We will discuss on Thursday to see if we can ratify as 27," announced Climate Commissioner Miguel Arias Cañete on Wednesday at a press conference.

Apparently it is' legallly possible to override the Polish opposition'.

This could set a legal precedent for overriding Hungary's veto on sanctions against Poland.

And even if they had, the Polish population is apparently still strongly in favour of remaining in the EU. There's no reason to imagine that they would support leaving the EU and throwing in their lot with a shambolic pan-Slavic union of some kind.

Out of all the stupid arguments against the EU by the Europhobic press, this is probably one of the most outstanding.

Somehow some people claim that the idea of a political Union is some sort of nefarious ploy that has only been implemented after countries joined because they were promised economic benefits.

Nobody who has any knowledge about the postwar European integration would ever come up with such an idea. Because political integration was always the idea behind the project, in fact the political founding fathers of the EU (Schuman, Jean Monnet, Konrad Adenauer among others) saw this as the most important long-term goal, because a United Europe would guarantee that there would be no further wars in Europe.

The European Coal and Steel Community was born out of the desire to control the ressources that could be used for war. Of course the politicians knew that European integration would also aid the economic recovery of the continent, and they used this as an argument why European integration was helpful, but if you read their speeches, they have made no secret behind their intentions (and a lot of people agreed and are still agreeing with them). I honestly don't know if the British people really voted to join because they were told this was exclusively an economic Union, certainly this was an important argument for the impoverished UK. But that would mean that the British people were willfully ignorant to the idea behind the EU (and its' predecessors) and if anything, reflects poorly on them. This is even more true for the Eastern European countries who joined even later. If you still believed that the EU was a solely economic project, I'd seriously question your judgement.

It's against all of our interests as EU members - and that includes the nation of Poland - to have an EU filled with divisions, open conflict and in-fighting.

oh yeah - so we need to submit to Germany's diktat - no divisions you know - we should abandon coal because Germany says so - we can't subsidy shipyards because the EU says so while France and Germany can (if you never seen a double standard here you got it) - we should show solidarity to Germany with taking refugees while Germany shows no solidarity to Poland with the building of both NordStreams - and we should avoid divisions like pest - it's in our interests to be united under Germany's diktat

and I told you not te be vague about what Irish interests have been threatened with the Polish-EU/German conflict (and you still were vague)

@peterwegLike Union of Traders? Union is about equality and the EU communist bureaucrats already talk about Two Speeds? Union is about democracy they fight for so fiercely yet they force quotas of Islamists to be accepted onto a country where HUGE and OVERWHELMING majority don't want them to come?

The euro is not dwindling, it has gained significantly against USD this year,

Euro is doing terrible. It's barely recovered since going consistently down since 2014. That's why Poland doesn't want to adopt the Euro. Not to mention that they'd totally up control of currency in their own country.

The states east of Germany are primarily interested in the economic aspects of the European union - not the political which was not a big deal and the countries generally got along since its creation till basically the 2010's - especially once Merkel and her fellow Brussels and German cronies like Schultz, Timmermans, and Juncker started issuing dictates that were against what millions of people wanted in their own country. So naturally citizens are going to be against a person they did not vote for esp when they're trying to push extreme changes in their countries. For 20 years it worked great till the far leftists started trying to dismantle the idea of the nation and push multiculturalism, de-Christianization and immigrants on the millions of European citizens who rejected such things.

Well, they refuse to find a middle ground and respect the fact we don't want to become countries full of immigrants from ME and Africa and want our Christian and national traditions to remain. Poland along with tens of millions of people and their conservative governments are behind this and are rejecting this part of the EU. Believe it, it won't just be Poland and Hungary who are bucking the EU. More are thinking the same way but playing along... for now... Czechy and Slovakia also said they don't want migrants. The EU isn't even as concerned anymore with the migrant issue but rather is punishing PL and Hungary because of supposed 'rule of law' violations and the far left financier Soros told his EU puppets to attack PL and Hungary - especially since the countries have been digging up dirt and sacking Soros offices and closing his socialist pushing university.

too much integration! easing the movement of people and economic transactions is fine to a point and then you hit the point of diminishing returns (the more effort you poor in the worse the results).

europe is simply too diverse for anything but the most basic type of political union, economic union is a proven failure because you can't have a currency that simultaneously works for production-based, banking-based and service-based economies. Turn Greece into an international banking hub, industrial powerbase or be resigned to its permanent impoverishment.

past a certain point, political and economic union requires that more and more regional differences be obliterated and I don't want that.